TERRY BORDERLINE is a blur of color as he dashes in and out of neon-walled studio rooms. The Brockton-based hip-hop artist writes, records, and performs music that touches on themes of indigenous history, spiritual Afro-futurism, and Black power. Strands of R&B, jazz, and hip-hop filter through the studio space.
Borderline, 30, works constantly to write, record, and perform music. On top of that, he teaches, mentors, plans events, and has his own company through which he sells clothing.
Despite all of the different ways he hustles, Borderline finds himself trapped in cycles of financial uncertainty. The grind is the normal rhythm of his life, and the stakes are high.
“Artists are the last to get paid for many different things,” said Borderline. “I have to feed my son at the end of the day. It’s not like I can just say: son, you have to wait four more business days.”
Borderline is one of many artists across the Commonwealth struggling to make ends meet.
Arts advocates say that the solution is political – to lobby for more funding and support for the arts. With the state in the midst of a particularly tough budget year, with tight revenue forecasts and a ballooning shelter spending invoice, arts groups say they need artists to step into a more active advocacy role to make the case that artists and arts organizations should be in line for the state’s limited resources.
“When elected officials hear regularly from constituents across the Commonwealth and they are hearing similar stories of impact, and very similar asks for action, it starts to really build that momentum,” said Emily Ruddock, the head of arts advocacy group MassCreative. She encourages artists to show up to the State House, go to public meetings, and ask lawmakers for the funding that they need to survive.
Paradoxically, the reason that artists need state support so desperately is the same reason they are often missing in political mobilizing: they are strapped for time and money.
“At times it feels as if simply advocating for our own rights as artists is an unpaid full-time job in and of itself,” said Borderline. “If we aren’t living check by check, doing whatever it takes to survive in this hyperinflated economy – we, for sure, would have more time to engage politically without feeling like our children are starving as a result.
Artists and advocates say that paying artists for the time they spend advocating might be the way forward. But even then, artists would need to decide it’s worth it to put their easels aside and head to Beacon Hill.
STARVING ARTISTS
Between inflation, the housing crisis, and millions in lost revenue for artists and arts organizations due to the COVID-19 pandemic, artists say they are facing an existential threat in Massachusetts. Even before the pandemic, artists in Massachusetts on average earned less than 400 percent of the federal poverty level, or, in most cases, below $40,000.
Many like Borderline are gig workers who juggle many different roles in order to make money. The artists who aren’t chasing gig after gig often have full-time jobs to make ends meet, which they say leaves them with barely enough time to pursue art – let alone advocacy.
“It’s incredibly hard to deviate from a survivalist mindset that we unfortunately are forced to be in 24/7,” said Borderline. “As an artist, who doesn’t necessarily make the most money in the world, I have to pre-occupy my days with various gigs to simply remain afloat.”
Borderline, his wife, and his 3-year-old son are all on MassHealth, the state’s Medicaid program. To qualify, you must make less than $34,857 for a family of three. They live on the lower floor of Borderline’s parents’ house and don’t expect that they will be able to afford their own place in Boston.
They’ve applied for affordable housing and haven’t heard back. They tried to buy a house through a housing assistance program by a non-profit called the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America and learned that they would have to make more than twice the amount they make to qualify. Borderline said that he and his wife have considered leaving the state because he knows that that is the only way his family will be able to achieve homeownership.
Many artists face similar challenges.
“These folks who are gig workers go from gig to gig to gig, selling one piece of art or teaching one class to make ends meet,” said Michael Bobbitt, the executive director of the Mass Cultural Council. “Many of them don’t have life benefits like insurance and retirement and housing and healthcare. To live like that is a tremendous burden.”
ARTISTS MISSING IN ADVOCACY
Advocates want to be clear that their work is bearing fruit for the artists.
Ruddock pointed out that the line item for MCC in the state budget has more than doubled in the last decade. MassCreative counts other wins: securing $60 million in COVID-19 Cultural Sector Recovery funding and drafting legislation favorable to artists which is currently making its way through the legislature.
At the end of March, arts organizations and legislators held a meeting to discuss various arts-related legislation. Advocates in the meeting highlighted a study done by the National Endowment for the Arts which showed that the arts and culture sector represented more than 4 percent of the state’s GDP.
However, time and time again, arts organizations have been disappointed by the amount of funding that has been diverted to the creative sector. Lawmakers are willing to support the arts, but the creative sector tends to lose out if essential resources are on the line.
“I’ve been happy to report that I haven’t received opposition to funding for the arts,” said Sen. Paul Mark, who represents Western Massachusetts and is co-chair of the tourism and arts joint committee. “But if budgets tighten up, I’m gonna get a lot more advocacy that other areas are more important.”
Arts advocates say a critical part of the pitch is getting artists themselves before lawmakers. Artists highlight not only the lack of time and money to lobby on the side, but some also express frustration when money goes to arts institutions rather than directly to artists. They can also feel siloed from information, not just about political advocacy but also about available grants or other funding opportunities.
“From my experience, [getting artists to] anything that is like a hearing is difficult, and I’m guilty as charged,” said Julia Cseko, a Brazilian-American visual artist currently working as the artist in residence in Salem. “Sometimes you just don’t have the bandwidth. It is exhaustion – mental exhaustion and physical exhaustion.”
Furthermore, securing funding for artists can also be a slow process at the state level and, according to Ruddock, artists can become discouraged.
“Everyone wants to see that [MCC] budget increase exponentially…and the reality is that securing $2 and $3 million increases year over year is actually a sign of incredible success,” said Ruddock. “But that doesn’t feel quite incredible when that translates to only small amounts of increases to individual grant programs.”
Arts advocates are trying to meet artists where they are to help them engage politically.
Ruddock and her team host monthly policy webinars that teach artists about how state politics works, how artists can reach out to elected officials, and how they can advocate for arts-related policies and funding at legislative hearings.
MassCreative has also worked with artists to come up with a legislative agenda. One bill would help preserve creative spaces by establishing a defined property restriction designating some land exclusively for artists.
Many advocates, staff from arts organizations, and arts administrators based all over the state testified in favor of the bill. Although the bill was reported favorably out of committee, there were very few practicing artists who made it out to the hearing.
One bright spot was a Creative Sector Advocacy Day at the State House on January 24, which drew over 200 people, Ruddock said it’s important for artists to show up at these events, but that’s not the only way artists can make a case for what they do.
“Individual artists are some of the best self-advocates I have ever met,” said Ruddock. “They are self-advocating and advocating for their communities all the time. They’re just not doing it in ways that are recognized as formal traditional political advocacy.”
PAYING ARTISTS FOR ADVOCACY
Borderline found the concept of building or joining an artist constituent group in the political sphere compelling, but he raised questions about how expensive advocacy can feel for artists.
“Rarely do I and other artists have the luxury of showing up anywhere without getting paid to do it first,” said Borderline. “Where does the money to pay for transit come from? The money to pay for parking? The money to pay for childcare for those of us with families?”
A potential solution is to pay artists to become involved in advocacy.
Cseko, who was previously engaged in advocacy when she was living as an artist in Brazil, said that she has seen an “ambassadorship” model work. This essentially involves picking artists willing to advocate for their communities and paying them a stipend to compensate them for their time and help them pay for the costs of showing up.
MassCreative has created a year-long organizing and advocacy fellowship program for people in the creative space with a $5,000 stipend. Fellows are supposed to receive leadership development to sharpen their advocacy skills.
Somerville Arts Council has also implemented a model like this – they compensated artist “ambassadors” $35 an hour to work with the artist community to provide input to the city’s planning process. While this wasn’t exactly paid advocacy, it was a way to get artists involved in local government decisions that would ultimately impact them.
However, these programs are just getting started and just as arts funding is hard to come by, funding for art advocacy is tough to secure.
“Nobody funds advocacy,” said Ruddock.